The Store That Isn't There

We have been somewhat perplexed watching what has been going on at the old Crate and Barrel location on Brattle Street.

For a while it looked like a new store was opening, with colorful displays of housewares you could see through the big windows. And then came the signs saying that you can't come in.

As near as we can figure, the iconic firm Design Research (D/R) had a store at this location in the 1970s, before making way for the more commercial Crate and Barrel.

Now with Crate and Barrel gone, they have reclaimed the space temporarily as a window showroom. You can walk by and look but you can't go in except by special invitation. We suspect this will continue until a paying tenant is found.


Could unmanned stores that never open except for private parties be the next big trend in retail? Having no sales clerks would definitely cut down on costs, but wouldn't sales suffer too?


But instead of a sign of the future, this may just be an ode to the past. We don't remember Design Research on Brattle street, but judging the baby boomer crowd at a recent reception there, older Cambridge residents do.

All the pretty textiles are also a reminder that New England used to be a textile center, back in the not-so-distant days when Berkshire Hathaway made fine men's shirts.

There is a Kennedy Connection here. The photograph of Jacqueline Kennedy on the December 1960 cover of Sports Illustrated shows her wearing a dress purchased at D/R.

You can still shop the Marimekko product line at 350 Huron Avenue in Cambridge. Customers are admitted Monday through Saturday 10am to 6pm (Thursdays until 7pm).

Note: click pictures for full resolution.

Lyle Lovett at the Orpheum Theatre

Just when you think Texas is all about pickup trucks and high school football under the Friday Night Lights, Lyle Lovett rolls into town with his two tour buses holding his large band, his small band, and four male backup gospel singers.

Going into the Orpheum, you walk down a narraw alley past the parked tour buses. At the appointed time, Lyle just followed the audience in, emerging into the orchestra seating through the audience entrance. The show got started around 7:45 pm and carried on for two and a half hours through 10:15 pm. Lyle and his bands cover every manner of music and play the audience too.


A little blurry? I guess you had to be there. It was great!

Goodbye Brother Blue

Brother Blue, the legendary storyteller of Harvard Square, has passed away.

You would often see Brother Blue walking through Harvard Square in his trademark blue garb with his wife Ruth. In recent years he did more audiencing than performing, but that was appreciated too.

The official biography is that Hugh Morgan Hill was born in Cleveland, Ohio, served in the army in both Europe and Asia during World War II, and was honorably discharged as a first lieutenant. Then he then earned his bachelor's degree in social relations from Harvard University, a master's of fine arts in playwrighting from Yale School of Drama, and a doctorate in storytelling from Union Graduate School.

The unofficial biography is that Brother Blue never held a "standard job" and made his living telling stories. He was an unofficial professor at Harvard University and its oldest unofficial undergraduate too.

He passed away this Tuesday at age 88 after a short illness. While the illness has not been publicly identified, I'm guessing it was what I am now calling the Blue Flu. Wife Ruth reports that just before he died, he told her a love story.

Rosanne Cash Is On My List

I have been listening to Rosanne Cash’s new album The List. Rosanne is the daughter of Johnny Cash, and the 12 Songs on The List are from a list of 100 essential country songs her father wrote out for her on a yellow legal pad in the summer 1973, the year she graduated from high school. The grand tour of Europe is the American ideal for fresh graduates, but can’t compete to spending the summer on a tour bus across America with Johnny Cash.

The album is very low key, and each of these great songs gets to speak for itself. Here’s the song list:

1. Miss The Mississippi And You – perhaps the first of the give up the big city and go back to the country songs. Jimmie Rodgers does a version with his famous yodel and Emmy Lou Harris does a great version too on her album Roses in the Snow.

2. Motherless Children – an A.P. Carter classic that has been covered by everyone. Don't ponder too long on the lyric "sister does the best she can but she really don't understand."

3. Sea of Heartbreak (featuring Bruce Springsteen) - Johnny Cash himself did a version of this song on Unchained but it was Don Gibson who made this a classic.

4. Take These Chains From My Heart - Hank Williams made this song famous but you may know the Ray Charles version better.

5. I'm Movin' On - the Hank Snow classic, covered by everyone from Elvis Presley to Willie Nelson. No, this is not the song by Rascal Flatts.

6. Heartaches By The Number (featuring Elvis Costello) - this song was a hit for Ray Price and Dwight Yoakam also does a nice cover.

7. 500 Miles - made famous by Peter, Paul, and Mary. You can hear the whistle blow 100 miles, but not at 500 miles from home. That's damn good hearing.

8. Long Black Veil (featuring Jeff Tweedy) - this ancient folk ballad was written in 1959. Johnny Cash did the definitive version on At Folsom Prison but Mick Jagger (with The Chieftains) did it justice too, as has Neko Case, and Hazel Dickens. Nobody knows but me.

9. She's Got You - Patsy Cline crossed over with this song. And I've got versions by Loretta Lynn, LeAnn Rhymes, Michelle Branch, and Red Molly.

10. Girl From The North Country - this has the reputation in some quarters as Bob Dylan's best song on The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan (everyone has a right to their favorite), and Johnny Cash sang it with him on Nashville Skyline.

11. Silver Wings (featuring Rufus Wainwright) - a Merle Haggard original. I'm guessing this was the song rattling around in Johnny Cash's head in that summer of 1973 and since has been slowly fading out of sight.

12. Bury Me Under The Weeping Willow - This was Maybelle Carter's song and the slightly humorous version by her daughter June Carter Cash at the Louisiana Hayride is good too, but check out Natalie Merchant on The House Carpenter's Daughter.

OK, that’s 12 but what are the other 88 songs? We may have to wait for 7 more albums to find out.

We do know that in a interview Rosanne has identified two as Battle of New Orleans and This Land is Your Land (good choices). The Porter Wagoner song Satisfied Mind is the Itunes bonus selection (unfair). And Sweet Memories featuring Chris Thile appears only on CDs sold at Barnes & Noble (double unfair).

Rosanne, if you think I'm going to two different places to get all the bonus tracks, you're on my list.

Caution - Coyote Sightings in Cemetery

We were hoping for cougars.

Five Candidates Race for the Ted Kennedy Senate Seat

We have ourselves a horse race in the special election here in Massachusetts to replace Ted Kennedy in the U.S. Senate. Five candidates have qualified for the race. Four Democrats are racing for the next 6 weeks to a primary election on December 8, the winner of which will face the one Republican in a general election 6 weeks later on January 19.

State Attorney General Martha Coakley is the odds-on favorite in early polling (everyone remembers voting her in as AG a couple of years back). As the only woman in the race, she is looking to Emily’s List to make her the 16th woman it has helped the Democratic Party elect to the U.S. Senate. Her reluctant stance on the federal economic stimulus and the health care public option (she says she's in favor, but ...) makes her the most conservative candidate in the race. Martha represents the Max Baucus wing of the Democratic Party.

Congressman Mike Capuano is the other party establishment candidate in the race. He’s running as the liberal’s liberal and the workingman’s workingman. He’s touting the largess he has brought back to his Congressional District (by counting the massive cost overruns on the Big Dig project, I suspect) and his service as Barney Frank’s first lieutenant on the House Financial Services Committee (how’d that work out for us?). Mike represents the Nancy Pelosi wing of the Democratic Party.

City Year Cofounder Alan Khazei is the dark horse in the race. The youngest candidate at age 48, he has never held elective office but has spent his life in public service since starting the much-admired City Year youth service program in 1988 (the signature red jackets are well known around the Metro-Boston area). As such he has perhaps the best claim to the Ted Kennedy mantle. Alan represents the Obama wing and Clinton wing of the Democratic Party.

Businessman Steve Pagliuca is the trojan horse in the race. He made $400 million at Bain Capital and as a coowner of the Boston Celtics NBA basketball team and is said to be willing to spend $20 million of that on the race. He’ll have some big name political consultants and the most TV ad time, but with the bailouts this is probably not the year for a businessman. I look for him to top out at 10% to 15% and finish in fourth place out of the money. Steve represents the big business wing of the Democratic Party (if you didn’t know it had one, think back to Ted’s father Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr.).

State Senator Scott Brown is the Republican stalking horse in the race. He currently serves as one of only five Republicans in the Massachusetts State Senate. With no competition on December 8, he goes straight to the January 19 general election. He appeared semi-nude in the June 1982 issue of Cosmopolitan Magazine after winning its “America’s Sexiest Man” contest. His daughter Alya went two rounds on American Idol in 2006. Scott represents the “not your father’s Republican” wing of the party.

The RNC would dig up Abe Lincoln if they could to win Ted Kennedy’s seat from the Democrats, so you’ll know if Scott has any chance by whether the Republican Party floods his campaign with money in December. But they won’t risk their high hopes for November 2010 by making a fight out of a losing cause in January. If Scott has an empty stocking at Christmas, you’ll know he has no chance.

My money is on the dark horse candidate Alan Khazei. Many Massachusetts political insiders have made the mistake of writing him off as a long shot. A long shot has little or no chance of winning. A dark horse hasn’t run before so no one has enough information to compute the true odds. I have seen Alan and his campaign staff and volunteers out on the campaign trail, and he is no long shot. He is the candidate to watch.

Charles River on Sunday, October 25, 2009

Pictures taken from the Charles River bike path between the Eliot Bridge in Cambridge and the Bridge Street bridge in Watertown on Sunday, October 25, 2009.